How to Murder a Millionaire (Movie Club Mysteries, Book 3): An Irish Cozy Mystery

by Zara Keane

  “Sure.” I selected a glossy brochure from the box, and my stomach lurched at the sight of a photo of Marley House, bringing back the horror of my weekend in its full Technicolor glory. “Didn’t you find it weird that the Huffingtons opted to stay another night at Marley House?”

  My aunt snorted. “They probably wanted to use the opportunity to get their stories straight before returning to Whisper Island.”

  I exhaled slowly and nodded. “That’s exactly what I suspect. One of them has to be the killer.”

  Noreen shuddered and clutched her teacup to her chest. “Which means one of them hit Reynolds over the head. I’m going to need to distract myself with wedding dresses, or I’ll never sleep tonight.”

  I glanced at my watch. “I’ll get moving on the brochure display.”

  “When are you due to be quizzed at the station?”

  “In twenty minutes. I have enough time to take care of the display first.”

  I took a selection of the tourist brochures and arranged them on the display stand, shifting the stand’s position to attract the attention of both the customers entering and exiting the café. I stood back to admire my handiwork. Not bad.

  The bell over the door jangled, heralding the arrival of more customers. Felicity, Huff’s assistant, walked in, accompanied by a man in his forties and a woman pushing retirement age. Their raincoats were slick with rain. They barely glanced my way in their haste to divest themselves of their wet clothing.

  My blood hummed with excitement. This was my chance to coax Felicity to talk about her murdered boss, but I had to approach her with caution. Even free from Huff’s aggressive presence, his personal assistant exuded shyness. The last thing I wanted to do was come on strong and scare her into silence.

  Jittery with impatience, I waited until Felicity and her friends were seated at the Marilyn Monroe table by the window. Plastering a smile on my tired face, I slipped my notepad and pen from my apron pocket and strolled over to their table.

  “Good morning. Can I take your order, or would you like a moment to look at the menu?”

  “Oh, I know what I want.” The older woman tapped the menu. “We were here last Friday. I’d like one of your delicious berry scones with clotted cream.”

  “Excellent choice. The berry scones are my favorite. Would you like something to drink?”

  “A pot of Earl Grey tea,” the woman said with a decisive air.

  “Earl Grey sounds good,” Felicity said. “Make it a large pot, and I’ll have a cup, too.”

  The man checked the coffee menu. “I’ll have an espresso and a full Irish breakfast.”

  “Sure.” I scribbled the order on my notepad and glanced at Felicity. “Oh, hi. I think I’ve seen you before.”

  The woman’s eyes widened, and she blinked several times. And then she blushed. “Oh, right. At Marley House.”

  “Yeah. I was one of the Huffingtons’ guests for the weekend.”

  “That’s one weekend none of us will forget,” the man said. “I’m George, by the way. I am—was—Huff’s valet.”

  “And I’m Mary Ryan, Mrs. Huffington’s nurse.” The older woman’s lined face grew grave. “Such an awful thing to happen.”

  “He was a difficult man,” I ventured. “Given his lack of charm to his guests, I can’t imagine he was easy to work for.”

  Felicity’s smile was wry. “You saw how he treated me. Temper tantrums were the norm for him.”

  “You didn’t have to deal with him at night when he’d had too much to drink,” George interjected. “If he was difficult sober, he was a nightmare when drunk.”

  “Why on earth did you stay in his employ if he treated you so abominably?” I asked. “Surely no job is worth that sort of aggravation?”

  “Employees rarely stuck with Huff for long,” Felicity said. “I intended to quit the moment we got back to Boston, but I have no regrets about taking the job.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You enjoyed being treated like dog excrement?”

  The woman laughed. “Hardly. No, I did it for the money.”

  The valet nodded. “Ditto.”

  Correctly interpreting my incredulous expression, Felicity elaborated. “Huff was notorious for being obnoxious to his staff, but he paid well above the usual rate for our services. I knew what I was getting into when I accepted the job. I saw it as a way to pay off the remainder of my student loans, and it worked.”

  Despite the humiliating scene I’d witnessed on Saturday, her words sounded sincere. “What will you do now?”

  The valet grinned at me. “That’s what we’ve met to discuss. If I’m out of a job, I intend to make the most of my time in Ireland.”

  “So do I,” Felicity said. “George and I plan to drive around the country for the next couple of weeks. The return tickets to Boston that Huff booked us are still valid. There’s no reason not to enjoy our time in Ireland.”

  I turned my attention to the older lady. “What about you? Do you intend to travel while you’re here?”

  “Oh, no. Huff’s death doesn’t affect my job. I won’t desert Mrs. Huffington when she needs me most.”

  “Is it true that Huff fired half his staff last week?”

  This elicited a peal of laughter from the table’s occupants.

  “He fired me every other day,” Felicity said.

  “And me more often,” George added. “I didn’t take him seriously.”

  “But isn’t it true that three members of staff left?”

  “Two,” the valet corrected. “I was one of the people he fired that day, but I ignored him. As for Jill and Alexis, they’d intended to quit anyway. Last I heard, they were touring Ireland, just like Felicity and I intend to do.”

  Distant church bells chimed the hour. My heart leaped in my chest. Ten o’clock. I was late for my appointment at the police station.

  “I’ll go and fill your order,” I said to Felicity and her friends. “If I don’t see you before you leave Whisper Island, enjoy your trip.”

  I hurried back to the counter and handed Noreen their order. Then I grabbed my coat and my bag and waved at my aunt. “I need to get moving. I’m late.”

  “Deep breaths and don’t lose your temper.”

  I grimaced. “I’ll do my best, but I’m not looking forward to this interview.”

  “You’ll be fine, love. Don’t let O’Shea bully you. Just tell him what you saw and leave it at that.”

  20

  DESPITE MY BEST intentions to follow my aunt’s advice, thirty seconds in the odious policeman’s company had me imagining ways to wipe the smug smile off his florid face. Sixty painful minutes of questions had followed before I was finally allowed to read over my formal statement and sign the document.

  Sergeant O’Shea leaned back in his cheap plastic chair and smirked. “Once again, Maggie Doyle is at the center of a crime. Why am I not surprised?”

  “I’m hardly at the center. It seems to me that Huff Huffington is the link between the murders and the attack on Sergeant Reynolds.”

  “True, but Mr. Huffington is dead. You are not.” These last words were delivered in a tone that indicated O’Shea was disappointed to find me still among the living.

  I gritted my teeth but let it slide. “My continued existence doesn’t make me responsible for two murders and an assault. Have you made progress on interviewing the Huffington family?”

  The older policeman’s nostrils flared. “What business is that of yours?”

  “Well, let’s see. I spent the weekend with them, and I found Huff’s body. I’d say that gives me a vested interest in the case.”

  “I’ll have none of your cheek,” the man snapped. “The private investigator’s license has gone to your head. You have no business poking your nose into police matters.”

  “Ah, but you see, that’s where you’re wrong.” I flashed him a saccharine smile. “Helen Huffington has hired me to clear her son’s name. The Jimmy Wright inquiry is very much my business.”

/>   O’Shea blanched before turning a shade of purple I’d last seen on Huff Huffington when he’d been about to chew out his hapless personal assistant. “I don’t care what she’s hired you to do. I don’t want you anywhere near this station or its staff. Don’t think I don’t know about you interrogating Reserve Garda Timms on the boat last night. I got the whole story out of him this morning.”

  Poor old Timms. He was a nice guy, but not the brightest, and definitely not able to stand up for himself during one of O’Shea’s temper tantrums. “I didn’t need to interrogate Timms. I was on Gull Island with the Huffingtons all weekend. Timms doesn’t know anything I don’t.”

  Sergeant O’Shea sneered. “I suppose your boyfriend let you run the show. The Hennessy brothers said you were snooping around the gardens together just before Reynolds was attacked. Perhaps your amateur detective act panicked the killer into attacking the sergeant.”

  “I was a police officer for several years before I moved to Whisper Island,” I pointed out, “and Reynolds was a detective for the Met. We’re hardly amateurs.”

  “If the pair of you knew what you were doing, Reynolds wouldn’t have gone and gotten himself knocked over the head. That would never have happened on my watch.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You wouldn’t have noticed something suspicious and tried to follow it up.”

  “That’s pure speculation. Until Reynolds has his wits about him, we don’t know why he was in that part of the garden. Nothing he’s said so far has made any sense.”

  Perhaps not to O’Shea. “I was with him yesterday. Maybe I can interpret what he’s said.”

  The man’s jowls wobbled, and he pointed a meaty finger at my chest. “This is police business. Keep your nose out of it.”

  For crying out loud. If this was an example of the rusty cogs in O’Shea’s brain working overtime, they needed an antirust treatment. “If you were capable of deductive reasoning, you’d see that the only way he’d have deviated from his plan to visit the shed was if he’d had a sound need to go back the way we’d just come.”

  “How dare you insult me in my own station.”

  O’Shea pulled at his collar, making me wonder, (a.) if I was about to witness him having a coronary, and (b.) what I’d do if he did. It was time to wrap up this charming interlude.

  “I have a job to do,” I said firmly. “As do you. So I suggest we both let each other get back to our respective professions.”

  “I’m not finished with you yet, Miss Doyle.”

  “That’s unfortunate because I’m finished with you.” I pushed back my chair and stood. “I’ve given you my statement regarding the attack on Sergeant Reynolds. You have no right to yell at me for carrying out a job I’m licensed to perform. I wasn’t obliged to tell you that Helen Huffington had hired me, but I extended you a professional courtesy.”

  This last part was baloney. I’d just wanted to tick him off and goad him into letting info slip. Which he had—I now knew I needed to track down the Hennessy brothers.

  When I swanned out of the interrogation room, Timms was at the desk. He cast me an apologetic look. “Sorry, Maggie. I didn’t say you were bothering me on the trip back from Gull Island. That was Sergeant O’Shea’s interpretation.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” I darted a glance at the still-closed door of the interrogation room. “Any updates on Reynolds?”

  “Nothing new.”

  “Has he asked to see me?” I adopted a love-struck mien and leaned forward. “Or said anything about me at all?”

  Timms gave me a pitying look. “Sorry, Maggie. He said nothing that made sense while I was there. Just kept going on about the color pink.”

  My heart sank. Nothing of use, then. “He must have been thinking about my cousin’s poncho. She lost it in the gardens yesterday.”

  Timms appeared relieved. “That must be it, then. I knew the sarge couldn’t be losing the plot.”

  I flashed him an ingratiating smile. “Could you give me his room number? I’d like to visit him this afternoon.”

  “No can do,” Timms said. “We’re assuming Reynolds was attacked in the line of duty. He has a police presence outside his hospital room, and only family is allowed to visit.”

  Although not being able to visit him sucked, I was glad to hear Reynolds had protection. Anyone desperate enough to attack a police officer and leave him to drown was very dangerous indeed. Cornered rats usually were. And I was in no doubt that Reynolds had said or seen something to cause Huff’s killer to panic.

  I retrieved my raincoat from the waiting room stand. “Thanks for keeping me updated, Timms. I appreciate it.”

  “No worries. If I have any more news, I’ll send you a message.”

  “Please do.”

  When I left the station, I pulled up my hood to fend off the heavy rain. As I walked back to my car, a thought struck me. How could Reynolds have known about Julie’s missing rain poncho? He hadn’t been with me when I’d offered to go back and look for it. Had his assailant been wearing it to conceal his or her identity?

  We’d never managed to find Julie’s poncho yesterday. With the stress of Reynolds’s attack, I’d forgotten all about it. What I did know was that the poncho hadn’t been in the Japanese garden, where Julie had assumed she’d lost it. Had someone used it to disguise themselves before attacking Reynolds? If so, they must have hidden it somewhere. A coat that color was hard to miss.

  I sat in my car and drummed my fingers on the steering wheel, brooding over the matter. I slipped my phone out of my pocket and sent Reynolds a get-well-soon text. Then I went online and found the number for Hennessy’s Garden Services.

  A gruff voice answered on the third ring. “Rob Hennessy speaking.”

  “Hi, Mr. Hennessy. This is Maggie Doyle. I was one of the Huffingtons’ guests this weekend.”

  The man grunted an acknowledgment. “I remember you.”

  I took a deep breath and plunged on. “My cousin lost her raincoat somewhere in the gardens. It’s a bright pink poncho. I was wondering if you’d found it anywhere.”

  “That Timms fella asked me the same thing,” the man said with a snort. “We tore up the gardens looking for it, but no luck.”

  “Thanks. If you have time, would you mind having another look?”

  “Why is this coat so important to you? Does it have something to do with Sergeant Reynolds being attacked.”

  “I’m not sure,” I said, careful not to elaborate on my theory that the attacker had used it to disguise him or herself. “All the same, I’d appreciate it if you’d keep an eye out for the poncho.

  “Why are you asking all these questions?” Hennessy demanded. “Why not leave it to the police?”

  The question was direct, and I took the bait. “I’m a private investigator. I’m looking into the attack on Reynolds.”

  In my defense, both statements were true. If Rob Hennessy assumed I’d been hired to investigate the attack, all the better.

  “I don’t want to be rude, Ms. Doyle, but I need to get back to work. What do you want to know from me?”

  “As far as I know, I was the last person to see Sergeant Reynolds before his attack. When I left him, I understood he wanted to take another look at the shed. Something must have happened to make him retrace his steps back to the Japanese garden. Did you see anyone in the gardens shortly before I raised the alarm?”

  “Yeah. A whole bunch of people.”

  My ears pricked up. “Could you tell me who?”

  “The Logans and that German guy were loading up Carl’s van. I don’t think they left their position in front of the house, though.”

  “Anyone else?” I prompted. “Maybe one of the Huffingtons?”

  “Yeah. The daughter went for a walk with one of the sons.”

  So Martha had been in the gardens at the time of the attack, and so had either Doug or Amb. I needed to find out which one. “Do you know which brother?” I asked. “Doug is the taller of the two, and Amb is the one w
ith the receding hairline.”

  “I have no idea. He and the girl were too far away, and they both held umbrellas.”

  “Thanks for your help, Mr. Hennessy. If you think of anything else that happened that day, anything at all that was out of the ordinary, would you please give me a call?”

  “Well…” he hesitated for a moment. “There was one thing that struck me as odd, but it wasn’t in the garden.

  “Go on,” I said, my heart rate picking up. “What happened?”

  “The plant outside Mr. and Mrs. Huffington’s bedroom. It’s dead.”

  “What?” I asked, baffled and trying to connect this unexpected announcement to the weekend’s dramatic events.

  “Yeah. A lovely Peace Lily.” The man sounded more regretful about the demise of the plant than he was about Mr. Huffington’s untimely death.

  “Peace lily…” I searched my memory for plant names. “That’s a spathiphyllum, right?”

  “Yeah. They’re easy-to-care-for indoor plants.”

  “How did it die?”

  “Someone dumped weed killer into its pot.”

  I wrinkled my brow. “Why would someone want to do that?”

  “Beats me,” Hennessy said with a growl. “I’d like to know why they mixed the weed killer with milk first.”

  I clutched the phone tighter. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m positive. The soil stank of sour milk and weed killer. I keep a close eye on the supplies in the shed.” Hennessy gave a derisive snort. “That O’Shea bloke didn’t want to listen to me, but I’m telling you that the bottle of weed killer I opened on Saturday morning is half empty. Someone was messing around with more than power tools in that shed.”

  “Sergeant O’Shea wasn’t interested in hearing about this?”

  Hennessy’s laugh was bitter. “Heck, no. He said it was irrelevant to the case. Maybe it is, and maybe it isn’t, but I’ve never seen such strange goings on at Marley House in all my years working there. Seems strange if it was just a coincidence.”

  I agreed, but I couldn’t yet make the poisoned plant fit into the weekend’s events. “Thanks for your time, Mr. Hennessy. I appreciate your candor.”